Clean rooms are areas defined within an exterior wall arrangement in which conditions such as temperature, humidity and airborne particulate contamination are closely controlled in order for workers to be able to perform certain environmentally-sensitive job functions. Examples of environmentally-sensitive industrial applications for which clean rooms are employed include handling of aerospace fluids in the aerospace industry, or materials in the pharmaceutical and biochemical industries, or microchips in the computer industry (see ASTM F318-78). The use of an effective and efficient clean room can significantly reduce the risk of contamination of these products and result in higher production yields and therefore higher profits.
Various known clean room systems can include partitions disposed within the interior of their exterior wall arrangement. All of these prior art internal partitions are installed in a fixed location. If they are relocated to other sites within the clean room, or if they are to be removed and stored away, such relocation or storage operations must be done by manually disassembling and carrying the component pieces of the partitions for reassembly upon relocation of the partitions. Examples of the above known fixed location clean room systems includes systems manufactured by Donn Corporation of Westlake, Ohio, which comprises a fixed, external panel-to-stud partition assembly for minimizing air passage and maintaining positive clean room pressure. Another clean room partition manufacturer for the aerospace and computer industries is Unistrut Corporation of Ann Arbor, Mich. In the Unistrut system, panels are fastened to fixed Unistrut framing to provide a positive seal while leaving a clean, ledge-free room wall seal.